Carbon emissions, consumption structure upgrading, and high-quality economic development: empirical evidence from China

Abstract

Environmental influence on the economy can be enhanced by consumption upgrading, transforming the key driver of economic development from supply to demand. This study constructs a model for consumption upgrading and applies threshold regression based on the susceptible–infectious–recovered (SIR) model, to explore the role of carbon emissions on high-quality economic development. The results reveal that the environmental input characterized by carbon emissions has an inverted U-shaped effect on high-quality economic development. A diminishing marginal rate of substitution of economic output demand to environment demand is observed during consumption upgrading. This study proves that environmental resources can assume both supply and demand roles for economic output and customers, which gradually emerge during consumption upgrading.

Keywords:

• Consumption upgrading
• high-quality economic development
• carbon emissions
• green total factor productivity
• environmental supply role
• environmental demand value

JELCODES:

• E21
• O13
• O47

Ethics approval and consent to participate

Not applicable. This manuscript does not report on or involve the use of any animal or human data or tissue.

Consent to publish

Not applicable. This manuscript does not contain data from any individual person.

Authors contributions

Both authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection and analysis were performed by Meng Liu, and the first draft of the manuscript was written by Meng Liu. Hanhui Hu assumed the role of Conceptualization in this paper. Both authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript, read and approved the final manuscript.

Availability of data and materials

The datasets used during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request. All data generated during this study are included in this published article and its supplementary information files.

Acknowledgement

We would like to thank the support from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (71873030).

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 Information Sources: Press Office of the State Council of the People’s Republic of China: Environmental Protection in China (1996–2005), People’s Daily, June 6, 2006, and the BP World Energy Statistics Yearbook, 2018.

2 Information Sources: Organization of the Propaganda Department of the CPC Central Committee: Xi Jinping's Thirty Lectures on Socialism with Chinese characteristics in the New era, Beijing: Study Press, 2018, pp. 265.

3 UNIDO, World Industrial Profiles and Trends (Chinese Version), China Foreign Translation and Publishing Company, 1980, p.90.

4 Because of the lack of data, the study samples do not include Taiwan, Tibet, Xinjiang, and Hong Kong and Macao Special Administrative Regions.

5 According to the study of threshold regression model undertaken by Hansen (1999), threshold variables must be strictly exogenous with the residual term.

6 Because an endogenous problem exists, LCon, DCon, and ECon cannot be simultaneously introduced into the regression at the same time. The robustness regression of introducing DCon is also carried out, and the results reveal no substantial difference. The relevant results are not reported here, but can be obtained from the author if necessary.

Additional information

Funding

We would like to thank the support from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (71873030).

Notes on contributors

Meng Liu

Meng Liu is currently PhD student of Economics at Southeast University of China. Her research topics primarily lies in industrial upgrading and sustainable economic development.

Hanhui Hu

Hanhui Hu is currently Professor of Economics at Southeast University of China. His research topics primarily lies in industrial organization and industrial upgrading.